Past Poisons
by Rory Forrester
Summary: Veronica Mars – The O.C. crossover. “We both have the poorlittleunlovedrichgirl thing going on. We’re both from SoCal. We both died young.” Lilly and Marissa meet in the Afterlife.
1. Chapter 1

**Title:** Past Poisons

**Summary:** Veronica Mars – The O.C. crossover. "We both have the poor-little-unloved-rich-girl thing going on. We're both from SoCal. We both died young." Lilly and Marissa meet in the Afterlife.

**Rating:** T (also, some swearing)

**A/N:** this just came to me one day, and I had to write it. Marissa might act like kind of a tool/brat in this at times, but that's cause I think she sorta was. Doesn't mean I didn't like her, I'm just writing it like I see it.

Chapter One: The View From Heaven

Marissa didn't know where she was, or what was going on, not at first. And then it all came rushing back to her. She was dead, gone, shattered, a bloodied memory, and right now she had no fucking clue where she was.

Marissa sighed, pushing some blond hair off her forehead. Well, she thought, I guess this solves the 'is there an after-life?' question. The only thing left to determine was if she was in heaven or hell. She figured that if she had to wait anymore in this stupid white room with all of this deafening silence, hell would be the answer.

She didn't understand where she was or why there was no one else there except for that pale blond woman sitting behind that strange counter-thing. Actually, it looked a lot like the reception desk at a hotel.

Marissa had never been patient, and soon she found herself striding towards the woman, seeking answers. Pasting a bright smile on her face (she'd found that, in life, this had been the best way to get what she wanted out of people), she leaned over the desk, "Hi, I was--"

The woman cut her off abruptly. "Name?"

"Marissa Rose Cooper", it flew out of her mouth automatically.

The woman was scanning what appeared to be a list. Her finger stopped and she looked up, "Died on June 10th at 9:14 pm, of a head wound from a car crash?"

Marissa nodded mutely, watching as the woman checked her name off a list and reached forward to press some sort of buzzer.

And all at once, it was like a television flickered on inside her head. She could see what was happening right now, but she could also see something else. The world she had left behind. The people she had loved and left. And they were in pain.

They were at the hospital. Ryan was hurt, his wrist fractured. Sandy was talking to the police. Kirsten was trying to comfort a screaming, disconsolate Julie. Kaitlin was sitting in the corner, looking small and alone. Summer was sobbing, her howls and Julie's wails drowning out all other sound. Seth was trying to reach out and hold his girlfriend, soothe her, but she refused to be calmed.

Marissa blinked and it was gone. She couldn't see them right now, couldn't see the pain she had caused.

And she was saved from thinking about it anymore by the arrival of a perky blond girl with bewitching eyes, carrying a clip board.

"Marissa Cooper?" the girl asked.

"Yeah," Marissa answered, curious to know who this girl was. She couldn't be older than 17, Marissa figured. Was she dead too?

Reading off her clipboard, the girl said, half to Marissa, half to herself, "Hmm…from Newport Beach, killed in a car accident, age 18," she paused, checking something off, "graduated from The Harbor School, daughter of Jimmy and Julie Cooper, sister of Kaitlin Cooper. Best friend of Summer Roberts, close friend of Seth Cohen's and Ryan Atwood's girlfriend."

Marissa opened her mouth to protest, "Ryan and I weren't dating when--"

The girl waved her off with an impatient hand. "Doesn't matter. Stupid labels like that don't matter much here. We only use them to help newbies like you understand what they mean. Ryan's your soul mate. And that's what's on my fact sheet here."

She went back to mumbling, leaving Marissa reeling. Ryan was her soulmate. Actually. She'd always thought that, but now it was for real. Someone had told her so. A potential all-knowing person (an angel?), with a clipboard. And now Ryan was left all alone, without her. Without his soulmate.

And she gulped, thinking how everything about her could be on a fact sheet. How Marissa Cooper could be summed up by one piece of paper.

All of a sudden, she was angry. She was fucking pissed. It wasn't even nice paper. It was printer paper. She was dead and her life facts, her essence, whatever was printed on a piece of white, flimsy, thin PRINTER PAPER.

Her anger was further fueled by hearing the girl mumble "…a bit of a diva, kind of a drama queen…"

She yanked the clipboard away. "Excuse me? I'm not a drama queen! Or a diva! Who are you, anyways?"

The girl looked at her, amused. "My name's Lilly Kane. And, honey, you are a diva. Don't feel bad about it. I'm 10 times the diva you are."

"Are you an angel or something?" Marissa is dubious.

Lilly snorted. "Please. I'm no angel. I'm your mentor." Marissa begins to interrupt, but Lilly keeps going. "When you die, The Receptionist assigns someone to you to show you the ropes. They try to pair similar people together."

"We're similar?" Marissa didn't think she had much in common with this girl.

"Oh, we are. We both have the poor-little-unloved-rich-girl thing going on. We're both from SoCal. We both died young."

"So I'm really dead?" Marissa is totally certain that she is, but she has to know. "This isn't some sort of twisted dream?"

Lilly reaches out and pinches Marissa's bony arm. "Nope. This isn't a dream, this is your life." She pauses, amused, to consider her words, "Well, death, I guess."

Marissa doesn't say anything. There is nothing to say.

Lilly's face softens a little bit. She bites her lip. "I know. It blows at first. And then it gets a lot worse because you see them all move on. And then it begins to get better. But it's a long painful process."

Marissa figured that if she was going to be stuck with this girl, she better agree with her. She nods. "How did you die?"

"Aaron Echolls, that little bitch, bashed my head in with an ashtray."

"The movie star? Oh my god, you're that girl from People Magazine!"

"Yep, that's me. I was fucking him, and he recorded it, and I was going to sell the tape to ET, and so he murdered me."

Silence.

"I was dating his son, Logan."

She watches as Marissa silently judges her.

"Oh, don't look at me like that. I was just looking for some excitement. Turns out I went looking for it in the wrong place. And I did care about Logan. I didn't love him the way he loved me, but he still meant a lot to me."

"Whatever." Marissa couldn't believe this girl. Why did she have to be assigned to her? Why couldn't she've gotten someone awesome, like Marilyn Monroe? She sighed. "Who was your mentor?"

"Oh, a girl named Laura Palmer. Nice girl."

Marissa nodded. "So, are we in heaven?"

"Heaven?" Lilly raised an eyebrow. "Sorry to disappoint, but that place doesn't exist. This is just an afterlife. We're just here. Good and bad. It's an okay place."

Something about this girl annoyed Marissa. She reminded her a bit of Summer, a bit of Kaitlin and a bit of Julie. And that was too much to handle. She began to cry.

Before she knew what was happening, Lilly was hugging her, her shorter frame comforting Marissa's lanky one.

"Oh, don't cry. I know it's hard and it's confusing. But don't cry. It won't bring you back."

Marissa continued to cry. She was so sick of this, all of this. She just wanted to go home. She wanted to be in Ryan's arms. She wanted to laugh with Summer. She wanted her mommy to stroke her hair and tell her that everything would be okay. And it was then that she really knew that she was dead. Because she'd never have wanted that in life.

She was too young to be dead. She didn't know how Lilly, who died even younger than Marissa could be so calm about this. The world was fucking unfair, that's what it was.

Lilly sighed, patting Marissa's back. "Look, let's go somewhere and sit. And you can tell me about them. It might make you feel better."

**A/N:** review! I know this is weird, but please review.


	2. Chapter 2

Chapter Two: Your Shadow Weighs A Ton

A/N: this is later on in Season Four (of the O.C.). Marissa and Lilly have become friends.

"You don't think it's wrong that we're drinking, do you?" Marissa asked Lilly in a rare burst of conscience.

"Nah."

"But we're under 21."

"Honey, we're gonna be under 21 for all eternity. I'm not going through all eternity without a drink.

"Fair enough." She and Lilly clinked drinks. Suddenly, Marissa sat up with a jolt.

"Oh my god! I can't believe that asshole! Look at him!" Marissa slurred, gesturing at Ryan kissing Taylor.

Lilly took a sip of her martini. The two were lying in bikinis by a giant pool, and they were watching Marissa's family and friends moving on.

"Yeah, that blows."

"It more than blows! It's fucking awful, that's what it is!" Marissa exclaimed, waving her flask around. "Look at him! Kissing her! He doesn't care about me! He's not even thinking about me!" She paused and took another gulp of vodka, "He's kissing Taylor fucking Townsend and I'm dead."

Lilly patted her arm.

"God, I hate that girl. How could he do this to me? She got me expelled! She got Ryan expelled! She's horrible."

"At least he's not hooking up with your best friend." Lilly said quietly.

"What?" Marissa asked, suddenly interested. Lilly rarely mentioned her life, and Marissa usually didn't mind (it gave her more time to talk about herself): if she didn't want to share, she didn't have to, but she was always interested in what was happening to Lilly's friends and family.

"My boyfriend and my best friend hooked up."

"Veronica and Logan, you mean?" Lilly had mentioned her best friend Veronica Mars and her boyfriend Logan Echolls before.

"Yep." Lilly nodded.

"That's awful!" Marissa exclaimed. "If Summer and Ryan hooked up I would be so mad. I can't believe they did that to you. What shitty friends."

Lilly nodded, sipping her drink again, her face growing cloudy. "I know!" she yelped. "And then he tells her that they're epic! Them! Epic!"

"Epic!" echoed Marissa, shocked.

"I know! Epic? I mean, hello, I was the one who got my head bashed in with an ashtray, and he calls her EPIC?" Lilly breathed in and out a few times, her face growing less red. "But they're not bad people, really."

"Not bad?" Marissa was appalled. She was livid about Ryan and Taylor and Lilly could get over Logan and Veronica so easily?

"No." Lilly shook her head, her voice calmer now. "Veronica's the best friend a girl could have. She found my killer and she nailed him to the wall. Of course, the police are assholes and they didn't convict him."

"Are you serious? Is he just wandering around free?"

Lilly smiled, "Oh, no. Duncan took care of him for me." Her grin grew a little wider, and Marissa could tell that Lilly was pleased that someone would kill for her.

"And Logan, well, it's for the best. Logan and I weren't meant to be. We're not soulmates. Logan and Veronica are. That I know." Lilly paused. "But if they weren't, I wouldn't forgive them. There'd be hell to pay."

"At least Veronica was loyal to you. What's Summer doing palling around Taylor?" Marissa was furious. She had been replaced by Taylor. Taylor Townsend, who probably didn't even care that she was dead; who was probably glad that she was dead. "God! I hate everything. My life…" she paused, "or death, or whatever…is so totally unfair!"

"At least you got to graduate." Lilly mumbled, not looking at her.

"What?"

"You got to graduate and you got to go to your prom." Lilly said. "I didn't. I always wanted to."

"It's not all it's cracked up to be." But Marissa was lying, and they both knew it. She was glad that she had passed those life milestones before she died.

"I just wish," Lilly's voice cracked a little bit, "I just wish that I could've done those things before I died."

Marissa had no words for, but just squeezed her hand sympathetically.

"I think that I was meant to die," Lilly mused.

Marissa was shocked, "What?"

"See, you weren't meant to die, but I think I was."

"What are you talking about?"

"It's just that I was too fabulous for life. I went looking for excitement and kept finding it in all the wrong places. It's just the way I was wired. And it caught up with me." Lilly drained her cocktail glass. "And Veronica. I think I had to die so that she could become awesome."

"How can you talk about this so calmly?" Marissa was impressed. "I can hardly get over the fact that I'm dead, and you just talk about it so calmly."

"I've been dead three years longer than you. You get used to it." Lilly shrugged. "But, see I think that you were meant to live. You had so many people who cared about you; I don't know why you didn't live. It's weird. But I guess life's just a bitch. So I don't know if you'll ever get over being dead."

Marissa just sat, watching her family and friends interact.

"There's always so much you wish you could tell them, isn't there?" Lilly sympathized.

"Yes!" Marissa smiled at her, she understood, "There's so much I wish I could've told them. I wish I could've told Ryan I loved him; and told my dad I wasn't mad at him; and told Kaitlin to be strong for Mom, and to stick with her; and told Summer that I'll always be there with her, even when I'm gone; and told Seth that I'm sorry that I didn't speak to him until we were 16; and told the Cohens thank you for everything; and..." she drifted off, wiping away a tear, "I wish I could've told my mother that I was sorry and that I didn't hate her. That I'd never hated her. I wish I could've told her that I loved her."

Lilly's heart broke for this girl, who, although something of a diva, was good at heart

"Don't cry, Marissa. They have to move on. You wouldn't want them to be stuck on you forever, would you?"

Marissa sniffled and shook her head.

But she was lying. And a few months later, when she heard Ryan tell Taylor he loved her, she made sure her wrath was felt.

**A/N:** okie, it's done. I know that it was weird, but reviews are greatly appreciated.


End file.
